Volume 1 - CH 7

Ponytail is suspecting Xü Beijin for one simple reason.

He looks nowhere like a good person.

Pale skin, dark eyebags, a deep, unreadable gaze, and a slightly worn white shirt, half of which is casually tucked inside his pants. He is the definition of the word ‘dishevelled.’

When Missiontakers see him, he always has his messy hairdo, with a glass of water in his hands, calmly and apathetically looking at everything outside. The occasional yawn is a sign of his sleep deprivation.

What is he looking at? What is he thinking about? Why does he not sleep?

In the Tower, many Missiontakers desperately wanted to enter Xü Beijin’s nightmare to challenge it for that reason, until they could see that Xü Beijin really was a monster that never slept before giving up.

And now, Ponytail is suspicious because of both Xü Beijin’s appearance and his identity in this Nightmare.

A haggard, possibly asocial man in a dilapidated bookstore, living right next to the dollmaker whose daughter has gone missing. He is awfully suspicious no matter what.

Also, in the third run of the Nightmare, they’ve been here once, where Xü Beijin told them that the daughter was missing and the couple was divorced.

Why would he know all that? Even if he’s their neighbour.

After they’ve got more information and come around again, why did the handsome, lazy man show a strange, mysterious smile?

Besides, the past Missiontakers all said that this man would provide basic information, yet as Glasses said, they concealed information on the second floor of the Dollmaker’s. Could it be possible that they also muddied the bookstore owner’s information?

Especially when even the dalao Lin Qin consistently comes over here these few runs of the Nightmare. True, many Missiontakers take Lin Qin to be a brainless fighting maniac, but Ponytail is not one to go by appearances or rumours.

Could Lin Qin have discovered something?

The information so aligned, Ponytail decided to suspect Xü Beijin. If the bookstore owner provided even more information after this, then it will only incriminate him further.

If Xü Beijin knew what she was thinking, he’d be begging for mercy right about now.

Why does he know everything? The Server arranged him so!

He’s just an extra! You Missiontakers shouldn’t be here talking to him so much in the first place! Look at that owner of the Dollmaker’s lying right up there! Wake him up and talk to him, please? Why look for him, why look for Xü Beijin instead!

And Lin Qin consistently coming over… The heck does that have to do with him! Ask Lin Qin instead!

Unfortunately, the number one suspect Xü Beijin knows nothing of such.

The audience suspects him because he wouldn’t appear. Yes, that makes sense.

Yet beyond that, he feels like his performance in this Nightmare so far has been perfectly adequate, right? Everything proceeded normally, no different from any other time.

So it must have been his appearance, the clothing, the scene, that is drawing suspicion to him, isn’t it.

Helpless, Xü Beijin wants to sigh.

He looks like an evil antagonist, sure, but he’s really a good person! Don’t judge a book by its cover!

And after all that brief thought, which merely appeared to be Xü Beijin mulling over his memories, he answers, “no, I haven’t run into that little girl.”

He answered frankly and truthfully, yet Ponytail takes the pause and mulling to be even more evidence for culpability.

And… little girl?

If he hasn’t ever run into or knew the daughter of the owner next door well, how did he know she was a little girl? She asked ‘daughter,’ which could refer to someone between a baby to a girl a few years old to possibly a teenager and even an adult woman.

This means that the bookstore owner did know about her.

Yet it is still not direct proof that he is the criminal.

Without changing in expression, Ponytail continues asking, “I heard the little girl has gone missing. Has she been found?”

“Not yet,” Xü Beijin shakes his head to sigh, continuing, “the owner next door and his wife… Oh, his ex-wife, now; sigh, never knowing what happened to their daughter is surely torture.”

Ponytail nods and asks, “did the store shut down because of it?”

“Yeah. The owner loved his daughter very much. She has gone missing for so long… He once told me his wife didn’t want to keep searching anymore, but he would still keep going, no matter what. They ended up closing the store altogether.”

“His wife didn’t want to continue? Did she not love her?”

Xü Beijin hesitates before saying, as per the new information provided by the Server, “that’s not it… But, she is pretty… strict, towards her daughter. Perhaps she expects a lot of her. Sometimes the daughter is beaten.”

“Beaten?”

Ponytail’s eyes seem to sparkle, while Quarrelsome and Lin Qin who has been listening quietly behind her also looks over.

This clearly indicates a second suspicious person.

Xü Beijin nods to explain, “before she has gone missing, I used to hear cries coming from next door in the dead of night, along with the woman’s scolding… I asked the owner about it once, but he didn’t want to talk about it, I guess. He would only say that his daughter did something wrong and made her angry; the wife left him about two months after the girl has gone missing.”

Ponytail nods, seemingly in thought.

There are now two suspicious targets. The bookstore owner, and, the girl’s mother.

She tries asking for more information, but Xü Beijin shakes his head in return. He does not know any more now.

Not that Ponytail thinks so. She is convinced that she just hasn’t acquired the requisite clues yet so they couldn’t trigger more information.

So thinking, she decides to head back for the doll store immediately. Quarrelsome follows, but Lin Qin stays behind.

When they are alone, Lin Qin is about to speak.

Xü Beijin intercepts to say, “no fighting.”

Lin Qin gives him a strange look before saying, “I know. I just wanted to ask, ‘can I sit down’?”

Xü Beijin “…”

He’s slightly embarrassed.

… What the hell is with Lin Qin suddenly going off the rails!

Xü Beijin expressionlessly says, “feel free.”

“Thanks.”

“No problem.”

Then silence ensues. Again.

Xü Beijin, again, decides to check on the others using the stream. He’s also slightly intrigued by the truth and developments of this Nightmare now.

… Not because he’s being suspected here, mind you.

Meanwhile, Glasses, after surviving the first wave of dolls, has returned to the store to meet back up with Ponytail and Quarrelsome.

When Ponytail glances at Glasses, still gasping, and then at the hatch leading up to the second floor, something hits her and she yells out, “no way!”

“What?”

Glasses is about to push the boxes open to head to the second floor again when Ponytail yells out. He pauses to ask, “what is it?”

“We always thought the Difficulty of this Nightmare lies in the dolls’ chase, but it’s wrong! No Difficulty would still remain easily dealt with after over four restarts!”

Her eyes glimmer. She looks like she’s convinced she has grasped a key aspect of this Nightmare.

Every Nightmare has Difficulties, or in other words, obstacles to the completion of the Nightmare. On the other hand, since they’re an obstacle to solving the Nightmare, it is also actually a hint pointing to the True End.

Ponytail nods to explain, “you were right. In this Nightmare, the chase isn’t the Difficulty. We can’t find a single clue during the chase. It’s a distraction. The true Difficulty must lie somewhere else!”

Glasses looks stunned; perhaps a little bit awkward too.

Quarrelsome chimes in with a smirk, “you really think he knows something? He just stumbled on it.”

Glasses gives him a glare.

Ponytail quickly mediates, saying, “alright alright. No matter what, we should quickly head to the second floor and check for clues in the rest of the rooms. We’ll skip the bedroom entirely!”

Quarrelsome asks, confused, “are we not waking up the owner?”

Glasses taunts him back in turn, “I’m really getting the vibe that you’re surviving this long only through relying on others. We still haven’t finished exploring or learnt anything useful about the case of the missing daughter. Wake up the owner now? Who knows if he’d lie to us.”

“That’s right,” Ponytail agrees, saying, “we must focus on gathering intel and scrutinise anything the NPCs say.”

It’s two on one, so Quarrelsome just says, “fine fine fine. We’ll do it your way.”

Though he is dissing inside, ‘then why did you believe the bookstore owner so easily.’

They now head for the second floor after reaching a temporary consensus. Glasses is the one to push the boxes away this time. In fact, his hands are still shaky while doing so, again reminded of the feeling leading up to his previous death.

Though that said, everything is possible in the Tower, except actual, real death.

No one can truly die. They can only struggle and resist the chaos and madness between the Tower and the Nightmares.

Some continue to go through Nightmare after Nightmare not even to escape anymore, but to be able to… die for good.

Glasses takes another deep breath and shakes his thoughts away. The girl doll jumps off the cabinet again, and quietly walks to his side.

He gives the doll an odd look, perhaps wondering why she didn’t say she wanted eyes this time.

Ponytail is hurrying him along already, though, since time is of the essence. He quickly follows.

The doll follows behind them, using all fours to slowly climb up the stairs. Inside, she is actually pretty upset, thinking how it’s the pair of eyes she disliked this time.

There’s just the three of them. She liked neither pair of eyes from before, but the big sister there wouldn’t lead her either… Hmph, then she’ll also ignore her!

She follows behind them while pouting inside, as nobody can read her mind from her rigid, unmoving doll face.

The three of them have made up their mind this time and heads right for the two unopened doors. Ponytail chooses the one on the right, the one right next to the bedroom door after little deliberation.

After pushing it open, she is ecstatic to see that this is a bedroom/study combo. On the reading desk, there are several opened letters!